PA Consulting acquires design firm Cooper Perkins
PA Consulting, a global innovation and transformation consultancy, has acquired Cooper Perkins, a Boston area-based engineering design company. Financial terms were not disclosed.
Founded in 2001 and headquartered in the Boston suburb of Lexington, Cooper Perkins is a technology development and product engineering consultancy specializing in the design of highly integrated electromechanical devices. The firm primarily supports health, life sciences, and consumer sector clients with developing innovative and well-engineered products.
The company is headed by CEO Gerhard Pawelka, and has patented more than 40 inventions.
One example of the Cooper Perkins’ recent work was teaming up with Essential Design (a PA company) to design Hydrow, an interactive rowing machine, with Essential Design developing the sculptural shape and Cooper Perkins developing the electromechanical dynamics. The product was named of one of the Best Inventions of 2020 by Time Magazine.
The firm also recently helped New Balance design a compact sensor that attaches to shoelaces and measures stride and foot strike to give targeted feedback and improve running form.
Cooper Perkins has approximately 30 consultants and engineers across offices in Lexington, MA and San Francisco.
PA Consulting’s acquisition of Cooper Perkins will strengthen its capabilities in product design and engineering. The added team will work with PA’s design studios in the US – Essential Design (acquired in 2018) and Astro Studios (acquired June 2020) – as well as PA’s Global Innovation and Technology Center in Cambridge, UK.
"It's great to welcome Gerhard Pawelka and the Cooper Perkins team to PA to strengthen our competitive offering in end-to-end innovation,” said Ken Toombs, CEO at PA Consulting. “Cooper Perkins' commitment to honoring engineering aligns with our own brand values, and we look forward to working together to continue creating ingenious products and solutions for our consumer, health and life sciences clients and other industries."
The London-headquartered firm supports clients in numerous industries with end-to-end innovation, from idea generation through to commercialization. Some of PA’s high-profile advisory projects include work on the Virgin Hyperloop transport technology and Ori Biotech’s cell and gene therapy manufacturing technology.
"PA Consulting is today exactly what we imagined Cooper Perkins growing into over the next several decades,” Pawelka said. “We are thrilled to join our new friends at PA, and our old friends at Essential and Astro, to help shape an exciting new future.”
